Jonathan Swift=Hater of mankind

Wow. How in the world can someone be so cruel, and stupid, and hating, and all that put together with some other equally negative things. I started reading his book "Gulliver's Travels" a week ago, and its very clear to me he is using his characters to express his feelings about man. That they are dishonest lying scum and the worst thing that happened to this earth. My brother tells me he even suggested that poor people should sell their newborns to the rich to be eaten and even wrote a whole book on it. He is a sick minded little (Mad libs anyone?)... Was he ever criticized or punished at all for his opinions?

What you are describing isn't very far from the truth about humanity, isn't it?
bernhard

http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html
Read the link.

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Mags said:
... Was he ever criticized or punished at all for his opinions?

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My only quip about your post is this sentence. While I do not agree with Swift's opinions and I find them downright disgusting I do not see how we could talk about punishing him for it. He could have been criticized but I do not know and he even could have been punished for all I know.
But we must be ever mindful of what can occur to all of us if we ever suggest punishing someone for an opinion. Just my .02 and forgive me if I read your sentence wrong.

Mags, it's satire.

Swift was portraying ridiculous situations in fiction to illustrate the absurdity of some of the societal issues of his day.

The "Modest Proposal" (see LifeNRA's link) should be read with this in mind.

Read about what was going on in Europe (particularly Ireland and England) while Swift wrote these texts. Their true meaning will become clearer.

Hookd On Photons,
Thank you for the information. I admit that I had only read the "Modest Proposal" once before many years ago. I was too lazy or too uninterested to dig any deeper at the time and forgot about it until tonight.
Thank you for the history lesson that I was too lazy to look up for myself. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thanks.gif

See this link for more:

"Satire is a literary technique of writing or art which exposes the follies of its subject (for example, individuals, organizations, or states) to ridicule, often as an intended means of provoking or preventing change."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satire

I know that sarcasm is still widely used in todays society, but perhaps satire is less well known now days /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Mr Swift pointed out our foibles by carrying them to the logical extreme minus any social filtering. A lot of people still continue to ignore horrible things because they believe "nobody would ever do that" or "that could never really happen" and there is the danger. People do horrible illogical things that you wouldn't believe. By carrying it 10 steps further, he makes it more obvious to us.

I liked him, I was hooked when I read the Modest Proposal. I also enjoy theonion.com and bbspot and a few other humor/satire sites.

Mags,

Would you care to point out where Swift was inaccurate in his general depiction of humanity?

IMO, if it wasn't accurate we wouldn't celebrate the exceptions.

Mags, if you really want to get a weird, bizarre outlook on life, check out the Marquis de Sade's writings. Swift will start looking like Mr. Rogers in comparison.

The Marquis is really a unique guy /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif, indeed.
Definitely worth reading.
bernie

Swift did say that he hated mankind, but he also said he loved Tom, and ****, and Harry. He hated what groups of people do to each other but cherished the individual. His writings, as in "A Modest Proposal" where he suggests that the Irish be used to raise children to be eaten and solve the hunger problem was biting satire and a knowledge of the times makes it clear how close to the truth it was.

http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/S/Swift.html has a fascinating bit of information about his fiction.